Julien Boucher's world championship blog

Day 4, September 16, Titomysl, Czech Republic

Our illnesses outside the court persist. While I felt much better, Glenn Hoag, Louis-Pierre Mainville and Justin Duff all continue to suffer from abdominal pains. Toon Van Lankvelt suffered bad indigestion the previous evening and did not participate in training and the match.

The rest of the team showed a higher energy level in the morning training and the level of intensity climbed a notch. Glenn decided to keep it simple. He put aside the formation with the middle in front of the setter which had worked relatively well against Cuba. We played tonight with the fourth attacker in front of the setter.

The other theme in training: counter defence. However the match tonight was similar to the other two. A 0-3 loss (19-25, 24-26, 23-25). It wasn’t a stellar performance and we lacked finish at the end of sets. Our top two scorers were our middles!!!

While we defended well, we made too many errors on execution and the experienced Czechs made us pay for it. We must regroup and work very hard to play at a superior level against the Poles, Serbs and Germans. Everyone must bear down and work for the team (these are Glenn’s words).

The first part of the trip is now complete and we leave for Bled tomorrow at 7 a.m... Long day ahead. More details tomorrow.